Visions of science go viral

This model of the HIV virus is one of the winners in the 2010 International Science and Engineering Visualization Challenge. Click on the image to launch a slideshow featuring the contest's top images.

Talk about going viral: The honorees in one of the world's most respected competitions for scientific visualization include views of some nasty-looking viruses, plus a host of videos that deserve to get some viral distribution. Take a look at the top of the crop in the 2010 International Science and Engineering Visualization Challenge, jointly sponsored by the journal Science and the National Science Foundation.

The visualization contest, which is currently in its eighth year, recognizes scientists and artists who use visual media to promote understanding of scientific research. The criteria for judging the entries include visual impact, effective communication, freshness and originality.

"We consider such 3-D models as a new way to present and promote scientific data about ubiquitous human viruses," Ivan Konstantinov of the Visual Science Company said in today's announcement of the contest results. Konstantinov said he and his colleagues tried to show the viral particle as realistically as possible.

"While working on the HIV model, over 100 articles from leading scientific journals were analyzed," he said. "For this project, Dr. Yegor Voronin from the Global HIV Vaccine Enterprise helped us evaluate the data, shared recent findings and views in the field, and provided general advice." Konstantinov said 3-D scientific modeling may have applications for the Web, for tablets and other mobile devices.

The first-place winner in the non-interactive media category used video to tell the story of 3,000 pieces of trash from Seattle that were tagged with sensors and tracked as they made their way through the nation's garbage disposal system.

"Our project aims to reveal the disposal process of our everyday objects, as well as to highlight potential inefficiencies in today's recycling and sanitation systems," Carlo Ratti, director of the "Trash | Track" video project from SENSEable City Lab at MIT, said in today's announcement.

"It was fascinating to see this invisible infrastructure unfold," said Dietmar Offenhuber, the project's team leader. "The extent and the complexity of the network of waste trajectories were quite unexpected."

The visualization challenge and similar roundups of scientific imagery such as Nikon's Small World contest and Olympus' BioScapes competition give a much-needed boost to public interest in science. It's easy to get sucked in by the science-fictiony pictures — and learn some science facts in the process.